


stood with our backs to the sun

by powerfulsound



Category: Devilman, Devilman Crybaby - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - The Time Traveler's Wife, Hurt No Comfort, M/M, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-10
Updated: 2018-01-10
Packaged: 2019-03-03 02:42:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,491
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13331796
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/powerfulsound/pseuds/powerfulsound
Summary: “The Light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.”





	stood with our backs to the sun

Ryou meets the devil when he is nothing more than the child.  
  
“Who are you?” He demands of this being, with blackened wings and an arrow tipped tail. The first words he speaks, but he doesn’t know it at that time. His simple clumsy tongue stumbles on the intent in a garble.  
  
The devil cries.  
  
Cries with big gulping intakes of breath that shakes his massive frame, a certain fragility present despite the blood on his face, and across his body.  
  
_“I love you.”_ The devil says instead, except Ryou doesn’t understand this at that time, but even as a child, he has a mind of a steel trap.  
  
So he keeps the words inside him, locks it away inside his brain, in the depths where there exists only this unknown emotion, and this foreign language, the first hint that Ryou exists out of this tiny space and the metallic taste of a still beating heart. He does not comprehend it, and he will not, not until the end.  
  
_“I will always love you.”_  
  
The mouth parts and closes, a finality in itself as Ryou gathers him in his arms, a child’s instinct to possess, and he disappears.  
  
Love.  
  
+  
  
He doesn’t remember anything before he meets Akira, a child with the weakest heart he has ever met. Soft. So soft it’s up to Ryou to be strong for him, to be cruel for him, to him, so that he learns what it means to exist in this world.  
  
Akira is warmth. Warm hands before Ryou even knows that he is cold.  
  
Akira is kindness. Kindness before Ryou even knows that he is cruel.  
  
Akira is the word _issho. “Together”_ before Ryou even knows that he is alone.  
  
Akira teaches Ryou to smile, to reciprocate a hug, to play, to _feel_. Joy, pleasure, irritation, anger - and Ryou learns expressions off Akira’s face, mimics his smile, and his frown, the act of his arms around Ryou, until there is nothing but golden light spun into being in his chest with some sort of incredible lightness, almost unbearable in its weight.  
  
+  
  
Akira cries a lot, so Ryou asks why.  
  
People cry when they feel sorrow.  
  
Sorrow.  
  
Ryou still doesn’t understand, so he doesn’t learn how to cry.  
  
+  
  
“I think I saw the end of the world Ryou, before I met you.” Akira says once, as they are spread underneath the night sky The cold is around them, and so is the endless night but Ryou has Akira’s hand in his, and they are both fascinated by the moon, and the stars, their pale distant light that holds no warmth at all.“There was light, but it could not be separated from the darkness.”  
  
“Maybe God didn’t see the light as good.”  
  
Ryou then, still didn’t understand why Akira cried.  
  
  
+  
  
He chases the devil man throughout thick books and ancient history. A vision. A sign. When Akira thinks of love, he thinks of the devil and he doesn’t know why.Love and sorrow, exists for him as two sides of a coin. To love is to feel sorrow. That is a truth that does not exist.  
  
The devil’s existence exists as a singularity for Ryou, and in return, Ryou builds his existence around the devil. To find him, is to find love, to find sadness and to find the truth of himself. Akira whines, but pulls out the fiftieth book that Ryou has made him bring to him. Two more falls on his head.  
  
+  
  
The devil appears as a man. Akira remains sleeping, exhausted from his useless tears and sporting a fever that has reduced him to a sobbing mess every time Ryou has tried to leave his side. The cat is dead, just as Ryou has warned him, and it is an inexorable conclusion.  
  
Akira who remained defiant in spite of futile hope, still struggles to come to terms with it.  
  
He narrows his eyes as the quiet man who kneels at the edge of the bed and cries, quietly as he tries to reach out to Ryou, before pulling back his hand and pressing to his chest instead, as though looking at Ryou has afflicted him with a physical wound in his heart. Metal glints in the dim light, reflecting off his ear.  
  
“Is it love?” Ryou asks, because that word has haunted him. To love is to feel sorrow.  
  
The man looks at him. Wordless as a lamb raised to the slaughter by a loving hand, a fervent adoration evident even with the promise of death and betrayal, and holding overwhelming sadness.  
  
It is enough for Ryou to feel the illusory heat of tears scalding him. He thinks he can taste salt in his mouth.  
  
+  
  
Love doesn’t exist.  
  
Because there is no such thing as love. Therefore, there’s no sorrow.  
  
+  
  
Jenny takes him away, and without Akira to distract him aside from silly emails that he still depends on his father’s inbox for, he focuses on the pursuit of knowledge instead, to find the devil in the ancient people.  
  
He finds demons instead.  
  
He finds Amon, and he decides that there is only worthy of his possession. The strongest and the most brutal demon for the weakest and the most gentle child.

He doesn’t know what is love, or sadness, but when he sees Akira become Devilman, he knows what is victory instead, some sort of golden light.  
  
+  
  
Love eludes him, but just as Akira taught him kindness, taught him hugs and friendly kisses, Akira teaches him lust and the physical pleasure of fucking. Unlike physical nourishment, this savagery that they can use to forge a connection is different, an intoxication similar to a madness in the blood, and Ryou learns the meaning of possession, of jealousy, of anger.  
  
+  
  
The girl wears the earring that his Devilman wore. When he points the gun at her, he does so with the clear image of her death and the churning savage joy in his heart.  
  
+  
  
A lesson for a lesson. Ryou teaches Akira cruelty. Teaches him the feeling of loss, of betrayal.  
  
Watching Akira walk away, the dejected slump of his shoulders causing his wings to droop, and a rift between them, a yawning chasm that can no longer be bridged, Ryou thinks he understands the latter too.  
  
+  
  
The devil appears as a teenager. Akira before the transformation.  
  
“Ryou?” There is only unfettered joy in Akira’s face and a tugging in Ryou’s chest, at the unbridled trust in those dark eyes.“Are those wings? Is it really you?”  
  
The boy looks at him. A lamb, still and he would always be a lamb for all that he masquerades as a wolf, not when he holds such fervent adoration.

They stood with their backs against the sun, and this Akira is a stranger and his truth both. Ryou knows that this is an illusion, that Akira will disappear if he tries to embrace him, but he does so all the same, because he thinks, he might never feel warmth again, never know kindness.  
  
He might never know “ _together”_ again.  
  
+  
  
Ryou meets the child when he is nothing more than Satan, the devil.  
  
In that moment of light, where he was sure that Akira would dodge his blow, Akira had disappeared for a split second, and reappeared to receive it with tears and a smile, even as Ryou severed his body from him.  
  
Akira who remained defiant in spite of futile hope, has finally accepted the conclusion.  
  
At the end, Ryou understands. Finally understands the truth that Akira has taught him. There is a light around them, that cannot be separated by the darkness, the moon and stars devoured by the night, and Akira devoured by Ryou.  
  
The son of the morning, of glorious dawn, knows splendour, but here, now, he understands the void, the absence of all things. His existence is built around the devil, that singularity, a black hole where physics ceases to exist, and space and time curves infinitely, but even that will not defy this ending.  
  
There is no longer sound. His glib, slick tongue holds intent, but have no words to speak with no one to hear.  
  
He understands love, he understands sorrow. He understands the pain and the grief he felt when he fell, but that was not defeat.  
  
This is.  
  
He holds Akira in his arms. Before him is Akira, as a child with the weakest heart he has ever met.  
  
_“I love you."_  
  
The words he have kept inside him, locked away inside his brain, in the depths where there exists only this unknown emotion, except it is clear now, clarity in his existence and despair, boundless and bare. Ryou does not exist out of this infinite space and the scalding taste of salt of his still beating heart. What pain can eternal flames bring him, that would hurt more than this? He comprehends it too. This is his punishment.  
  
_"I will always love you.”_  
  
The child cries.  
  


**Author's Note:**

> send your tears to Masaaki Yuasa


End file.
